His last words were of her—his last look rested upon her portrait that hung opposite his bed, and if there be dreaming in the dark, the vision of her brought him peace at last. [Pg 105] [Pg 105] The Bachelor President’s Loyalty to a Memory The fifteenth President was remarkable among the men of his time for his lifelong fidelity to one woman, for since the days of knight-errantry such devotion has been as rare as it is beautiful. The young lawyer came of Scotch-Irish parentage, and to this blending of blood were probably in part due his deep love and steadfastness. There was rather more of the Irish than of the Scotch in his face, and when we read that his overflowing spirits were too much for the college in which he had been placed, and that, for “reasons of public policy,” the honours which he had earned were on commencement day given to another, it is evident that he may sometimes have felt that he owed allegiance primarily to the Emerald Isle. T [Pg 106] [Pg 106] Like others, who have been capable of deep and lasting passion, James Buchanan loved his mother. Among his papers there was found a fragment of an autobiography, which ended in 1816, when the writer was only twenty-five years of age. He says his father was “a kind father, a sincere friend, and an honest and religious man,” but on the subject of his mother he waxes eloquent: “Considering her limited opportunities in early life [he writes], my mother was a remarkable woman. The daughter of a country farmer, engaged in household employment from early life until after my father’s death, she yet found time to read much, and to reflect deeply on what she read. “She had a great fondness for poetry, and could repeat with ease all the passages in her favorite authors which struck her fancy. These were Milton, Pope, Young, Cowper, and Thompson. “I do not think, at least until a late period in life, she had ever read a criticism on any one of these authors, and yet such was the correctness of her natural taste, that she had selected for herself, and could repeat, [Pg 107]every passage in them which has been admired.... [Pg 107] “For her sons, as they grew up successively, she was a delightful and instructive
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